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tv   The Last Word  MSNBC  March 8, 2013 7:00pm-8:00pm PST

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three quarters of an ounce of good gin, we're using this from wisconsin. it is delicious and ignores wisconsin's governor, scott walker, for me to use a wisconsin product. this is quantreau, a clear one, if you use grand marnier, it will taste similar, except it is not clear. this is like fancy french thunderbird, a vermouthy, fortified wine thing, my sister-in-law loves this, perhaps too much. and just kidding. and, very special ingredient, fresh lemon juice, it must be from a fruit, if you have something called lemon juice from a store, and they didn't
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spend lemon with all the vowels o -- there we go. i love it. three quarters, now, the really difficult thing about the corpse reviver, is that -- it is really easy, all equal parts, tree quarters of an ounce of gin, cointreau, here is the hard part, two drops of absinthe, it is impossible to get two drops of anything unless you're the kind of person who has an eyedropper around. and if you are the kind that has an eyedropper around, you're probably not watching cable tv for your cocktail recipes. so see what you can do to get two drops. i use a paring knife. shake it. for more than you think you need to, until your hands feel really cold.
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and? the corpse will be revived. or as they say in the serious drinking business, if you have one too many of these, the corporation will become un-revived. happy friday, the recipe is at maddowblog.com. have a great night, see you later. as a great economist in the british verse, the u.s. economy gets knocked down but gets up again, but the republicans try to keep it down. the stunning new numbers on the economy today. >> hostage job gains. >> the private sector kicked in, in a big way. 236 thousand jobs added last month. >> 236 thousand. >> the nation's unemployment rate. >> fell two notches. >> 7.7%. >> this is a bit of a surprise. >> robust. >> because of a all the housing stuff we have been talking
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about. >> robust. >> the economy is moving in the right direction. >> the dow reaching record-high levels. >> that is great, right? >> that is good news. >> you know, the sequester has happened. >> how does that change the equation? the dire predictions that we have heard regarding the sequester? >> we need to do everything we can to avoid self-inflicting wounds. >> people are finally optimistic. >> but it has to be based on common sense. >> i would like to say that common sense has come out of the closet. >> bill clinton calls for an end to doma. >> former president bill clinton is having a change of heart and urging the supreme court to do the same. >> clinton made doma the law of the land, clearly he was not proud to do. it was done under the cover of darkness. >> i believe that doma is unconstitutional. >> we learned from history. >> i know it is unconstitutional. >> we learn from history. >> this is a discriminatory law. >> this is a civil rights battle that is very nearly won.
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>> we learned today that the economy added 236,000 jobs in february. and the unemployment rate is down to 7.7%. the lowest since 2008. and all of that is very good news. now, sometimes these jobs reports, it can be sort of good news at the top. bad news inside, like a rotten oreo, but not really in this one. 48,000 new construction jobs, and 150,000 since september, a real sign of improving housing market. 24,000 means people are shopping and stores are bullish, they believe they will continue to shop. and hourly wages went up. the take-up? you just can't keep the american economy down, we're resilient, we're scrappy. we get knocked down, we get up again. which is not to say that congress is not trying. you guys probably heard about
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the great krugman/charlie rose smack down apocalypse. it was kind of boring. but the whole point of the great clash is the guys hate each other and disagree. you have to pick a side. now anything they do agree on, anything that unites the bearded economist guy and the class of '94, congressman guy, anything they can come together on that must be approaching a near universal truth. like puppies are cute and terrorists are bad. and i'm not even sure that joe scaborough thinks they're bad. he may be controversial. whatever is in the middle of the d diagram, that must really be the apple pie stuff. well, here is liberal economist, paul krugman, agreeing that
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taking money out, the contractary policy is the wrong thing to support. >> would you support an extra $200 billion in infrastructure and education? >> oh, yeah, i talk about it all the time. >> and he does, i have heard joe sca sca scarbrugh talking about it all the time, when they are in the agreement, standing fast to the puppies are totally ugly, the take money out now in the weak economy position. consider now what our chumba wumba have been dealing with, over the objections of the obama administration. let the payroll tax hike expire, it may be part of why in one of the jobs reports the few bad numbers, the january jobs
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numbers revised down. also, washington raised taxes on the wealthy, democrats like that. but it is contractionary. the republicans decided to embrace the sequester. we will have to wait until next month's jobs report to see the beginning of the impact of that. it will be very bad this year. nobody is talking about more stimulus the way krugman scarborough are. there are hints that republicans may want to repeat the awesome debt ceiling horrible disaster of 2011. wall street headline was boehner continues to link that debt ceiling to cuts. house speaker boehner on thursday said he would continue to insist the next debt ceiling cuts be matched by the spending
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cuts, raised by the prospect. there is something to look forward to. what happened to the economy when we had a high stakes showdown? we've seen this movie before. this chart is all you need to know. that red circle right there, that is the big dip in new jobs added to the economy in may, june, july and august, where the united states was seriously talking about defaulting on the debt. we basically cut our job creation in half for that period. it was unprecedented. unnecessary, completely damaging economic sabotage. and washington keeps coming up with new and unusual ways to scare the economy, to take money and confidence out of the economy, none more twisted than taking the nation's credit rating and credit worthyness hostage. but washington, there is a way to stop doing it. it is not that complicated. just stop doing it. they could go home, go an
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vacation, don't do things that hurt the economy. take an oath. one more number on the jobs report, 7.2%, is what the unemployment rate would be if government employment had stayed at the same level as 2008. we know we could have saved the jobs if we had wanted to. the we could have hired 100,000 new teacher's assistants and park rangers, and those people could spend money and buy thing s and create jobs. that is the easy stuff, the low-hanging fruit. the american economy is doing a great job, despite congress's continuing efforts to hurt it. just think what the american economy could be doing if congress actually tried to help it. joining me now, robert reich, good to see you, robert. >> hi, ezra. >> so give me your broad take on the jobs numbers. >> well, very encouraging news,
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not only do you get the numbers and the unemployment rate going down, but most of the numbers behind the numbers are also very good, construction, most sectors, retail, restaurant, hotel, i mean you have a fairly broad based jobs recovery. but you are absolutely right. i mean, the american economy is like a huge boxer that keeps on trying to get up, and just about gets up and is very resilient. but then gets slammed down again, and most of the slamming down is public policy, and that public policy has been pushed again and again by the republican party. the sequester is only the last. >> what is kind of amazing to me about this kind of crisis continuance and the uncertainty created, the big thing in 2010 holding america back, was what they called policy uncertainty. big businesses didn't know what was happening because of obama care and the fiscal cliff.
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and then they come into power and they are creating just week by week, huge uncertainty over the next crisis. will we shut down the government at the end of the month? will we go into a debt ceiling crisis in the summer? will the sequester actually remain or go away? they really had in 2010, when they said all washington needed to do was get a bit more certainty, get out of the way. since coming in, they have made it their mission to create a pretty much unprecedented sort of crisis uncertainty that we just haven't ever seen before. >> well, not only the uncertainty, but they also in their hearts seem to believe in austerity economics, the very notion when you have high unemployment, the best thing to do for government is cut back spending. and if you cut back government spending and consumer spending at the same time you are just going to have higher unemployment. and we know that. that is why the sequester is so dangerous. and that is why also the other
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republican kind of doctrinaire of trickle-down economics that has been with us for what? 30 years, is also so bizarre and dangerous for the economy. because the rich and big corporations don't create jobs. the job creators are the vast middle class and everybody wants to join the middle class. it is their spending that creates the incentives for businesses to expand and hire. and we've seen that over the last couple of months. were it not for consumer spending going up, businesses would not then begin to hire. >> how do you think -- if washington decided they wanted to help, how much do you think realistically could be done, maybe long-term stimulus or debt reduction, how much could that do to boost the economy over the next year? >> oh, i think it could boost it significantly. for example, if we continued the payroll tax cut. if we hadn't increased payroll taxes and if we had not em
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barked upon sequestration, the economy would probably continue to grow at a fairly healthy, now we have to put these words in quotes. healthy, that is 2 to 3% this year, which would continue to bring unemployment down. if on top of that washington were to embark upon the kind of stimulus that joe scarborough and paul krugman both agreed on, two 100 more in education and spending, then you could see increases. but the chances of those happening right now are nil. >> they're quite low, that is n unfortunate, robert reich, thank you for joining us. thank you. >> and bill clinton did that something, not the one i'm talking about. 17 years ago he signed something into law he now says is
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unconstitutional. his mistake and the remedy for it are next. and elizabeth warren wants to know why an ounce of coke will get you jail time, but a billion dollars worth of drugs laundered will get you a fine. id the details and guided me through every step of the process. i know wherever the military sends me, i can depend on quicken loans. [ bop ] [ bop ] [ bop ] you can do that all you want, i don't like v8 juice. [ male announcer ] how about v8 v-fusion. a full serving of vegetables, a full serving of fruit. but what you taste is the fruit. so even you... could've had a v8. from capital one... boris earns unlimited rewards for his small business. can i get the smith contract, please? thank you. that's three new paper shredders. [ boris ] put 'em on my spark card. [ garth ] boris' small business earns 2% cash back on every purchase every day.
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forty years on, it's still a class-a nature reserve. it's our job to look after them. ...it's my job to look after it. ♪ . if you have always dreamed of getting a nobel prize well, get in line, nerd, i have always dreamed of it. if you just want one to look at or take out at parties or to hold when you give pretend acceptance speeches to the mirror. not that i do that. i just have a friend that does that. have we got a deal for you. there is a nobel prize for sale, in medicine, to be precise. i'll give you a couple of seconds to remember who won it that year. give up?
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francis quick, and his friend, james watson. it is criks medal, part of the proceeds to benefit the francis crick museum. he decorated the walls with the portrait of charles darwin. he discovered the structure of dna. you don't have to be so modest.
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for example, back in march, 1857, the supreme court ruled that people of african descent could never be full u.s. citizens. the scott decision basically said that all men were created equal. that part of the constitution, didn't apply to black people. slave or free. in his majority opinion of the court, the chief justice wrote it is too clear for dispute. the enslaved african race were for the intended to be included, and formed no part of the people who framed and adopted this declaration. obviously, he was wrong, and 11 years later that decision was overruled by the 14th amendment. and today, we look back on dredd scott with revulsion, and decisions made in one generation can seem repulsive to others, and not just that, but unconstitutional. the experiment that america has evolved to include and protect
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the men and women in the past that we hurt. in burke county, georgia, eight black residents filed suit alleging that the election system kept them off the commission as board, despite the blacks being a majority of the county's population. in the lodge case, the supreme court ruled in favor of the black residents, the court found that while the original state policy on the systems was "neutral in origin," over time it was maintained for discriminatory reasons. in this case, it was against the black majority residents. in 1998, two gay men in texas were arrested for engaging in sexual intercourse, which was at the time banned in the lone star state. in the decision, the supreme court went back on the decision and allowed the states to ban the law. justice kennedy wrote, nations that can see that laws once
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thought proper can serve only to oppress, they can invoke their principles for search for greater freedom. as the constitution endures. this is an important point by justice kennedy, one reason the constitution does endure is that it is written so that it can survive, changing across generations, and adjust as society adjusts. gay marriage may be the next example of this, may be the next example of what society once thought was constitutional. and in 1996, when the defense of marriage or doma, few thought it was unconstitutional. now it could possibly be the next law repealed by the supreme court, and not on a technical point. but because society has redefined who counts as us in the american experiment. has redefined what normal behavior is, and thus what the constitution protects.
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president bill clinton, who signed doma into law 17 years ago, wrote this in a new material. he wrote, doma will come before the supreme court and the justices must decide whether it is consistent with a nation that admires principles of freedom and justice above all, and is therefore, constitutional. as the president who signed the act into law i have come to believe that doma is contrary to those laws and in fact, incompatible with the constitution. the american principle is potentially evolving again. nina, good to see you here tonight. >> nice to see you, ezra. >> what do you think it means to the court that bill clinton came out today and said he was wrong? and that this bill he signed into law is in his view, fundamentally unconstitutional? >> i actually don't think what he says makes a huge difference. the country has changed so dramatically over the last even
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five years, or seven years that as president clinton conceded in his op-ed piece, you could not imagine the change 15 years ago. or 18 years ago. it is just inconceivable, the society -- societal switch and the switch in public opinion. that is not to say that the country is united in its view on this issue. and there are many people who believe and continue to believe, and for all i know the supreme court will say that well, society may change but society has a way to change and that is through the democratic process by changing the law. >> do you think given that, that the defense of marriage act will be overturned? i mean, what is the sort of conventional wisdom on what the court will do. >> well, there are two decisions before the court. and in some senses, the doma case is the easier of the two.
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because there are nine states, including the district of columbia, where marriage is legal. and marriage is traditionally the prerogative of the state law. the problem is, the congress that is legislated this, in this particular case before the court, we have a woman who was partnered with the woman for years, when the new york court would finally recognize the marriage. and when her partner died. when her spouse died, then she had to pay $363,000 in federal estate taxes that she would not have had to pay if her spouse was a man instead of a woman. and i think that probably hits, for one of the better expression, the federalism sweet spot for at least five of the justices and maybe more. that new york recognized the
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marriage. and under the equal protection clause, she is being treated differently than other married couples, other legally married couples. >> when you talk about the federals and sweet spot there, this belief that sort of the center of the court is about that has a real strong pull towards state's rights, i often think that is about the real desire to tailor the court cases. i thought what he wrote is really eloquent, and really implied the desire not to be on the wrong side of history. where do people think he is going to end up in the cases? do they believe it is going to be a narrow one, or an eexpansie
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one. >> there is this possibility that every state has to recognize gay marriage if it is a fundamental constitutional right. my sense is that is less likely, the court is less likely to go that far. but you can really never be sure. and i am loathe to speak for any of these people. i am perfectly happy to be an li -- analyst, but i have been wrong enough. >> nina totenberg, that is probably wise. >> thank you. there is an election next week, one that follows rules made in latin, and burns all the ballots when it is done. i'll explain all you need to know when you pick a pope, in under two minutes coming up next. [ in
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contractionac . you thought the elections were over? no, the campaigns continue, which means so does my favorite msnbc jingle, which you just got to hear. this year, there are elections from new jersey, boston, new york city, but there is a big one next week. the election for pope. my two-minute challenge tonight is to explain to you how that election works. and it is weird. get the clock. all right, today, the college of cardinals decided the conclave
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will begin next tuesday, coming from a latin phrase, meaning under lock and key. on tuesday, 115 of the 207 cardinals will go into the sistine chapel, take a vow, and lock the doors. only cardinals under the age of 80 can vote. and get paper ballots which translate to i elect, and the cardinals then go to the altar, and if no candidate receives two thirds of the vote plus one in several rounds of balloting, the ballots are then bound together with needle and thread, and burned with straw making black smoke. no pope. after three days of voting, they take a day off, followed by more sessions of voting. after 33 votes, if nobody gets a vote plus one, they pick a top candidate until somebody gets to
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the magic number. when that happens, the ballots are burned to make white straw, and we know there is a new pope. they can include any baptistised ma male, finally, after prayer, a cardinal said the name of a 79-year-old benedictine monk, they had to track him down, beg, and intimidate him to be pope. he is remembered for two things, one, the reinstatement of the conclave, the other, the edict allowing the pope to resign, which did, and he resigned. i imagine the pope will be treated better than him. his successor locked him in prison, where he died a few months later. it is no longer about too big to fail. it is something much scarier
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. the spotlight tonight, a very disturbing admission from
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attorney general eric holder. >> i am concerned that the size of some of these institutions becomes so large that it does become difficult for us to -- to prosecute them, when we are hit with -- indications that if you do prosecute, if you do bring a criminal charge it will have a negative impact on the national economy, perhaps even the world economy. and i think that is a function of the fact that some of these institutions have become too large. >> the institutions, in question they are very large, large banks, one in question, doing a lot of drug laundering. and holder was not the first to express concern. a few weeks ago we showed you this. >> tell me a little bit about the last few times you have taken the biggest financial institutions on wall street all the way to a trial. >> we do not have to bring the people -- a trial, or --
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>> well i appreciate that you say you don't have to bring them to trial. my question is, when did you bring them to trial? >> we have not had to do that. >> and the term too big to fail has become too big for trial seems wrong to me. >> so the attorney general and two federal regulators explaining why they don't like to take banks to trial. but in a way, attorney general's holder's explanation was clear. he clarified the attorney general of the united states, a pretty powerful guy, said that banks are too big. that when you try to bring a criminal charge it is too difficult to do. and plus, you're discouraged by people saying it would rattle world markets. but if these banks are too big to jail, that means they would truly be too big to hold -- too
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exist. joining me now is felix salmon, and eliot spitzer who prosecuted many cases in the financial sector, do you buy what holder is saying here? >> he is wrong at so many different levels. i give him credit for honesty. he finally explained why this administration and the department of justice has been a failure when it comes to enforcing the rules of integrity in the market place, they're afraid they're out-negotiated. they're not too big to jail or prosecute. but this is unfortunately what the justice department believes. and as a consequence, we now not only guarantee the deposits, we guarantee the returns, we created the behemoths that are too big to break up. that is the logical conclusion of his statement, but he is too phrase to articulate it.
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>> and felix, while people want to see criminal prosecution and folks brought to jail it actually may just not be the best thing, or accomplish anything, so where do you fall in this. >> so i half agree with the governor, that yes, the banks should be broken up so they are small enough to prosecute. but so long as they are too big to fail. and there are many too big to fail systemically important institutions in the world and the u.s., i think the attorney general is right. they are too big to prosecute. if you prosecute them and you win a prosecution, they lose their banking license. if they lose their banking license they basically have to close down. we know what happens when the banks close in a chaotic manner. we saw it in lehman brothers, which was relatively small by the standards. >> you would wind up throwing tens of thousands out of jobs, throwing the entire segment into dissaray, and trying to add that up --
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>> i think that felix is portraying a perspective in a world of gloom and doom that wouldn't happen. there is a rational way to say to a bank, such as this, what we do with three fel-- street felo say to them, if we have the third prosecution or guilty plea, we'll take you and restructure you and sell off the pieces of the bank. we're not throwing thousands of people out of work. we're taking the pieces of your institutions and giving it to others who will fill the void. the world has not failed to have account accountants, there are ways to mitigate the collateral consequences. if we don't say to the institutions you will be prosecuted, they felt they were not sanctioned whatsoever. these corporations want the rights of individuals without
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the responsibilities of individuals and we've given it to them. >> now arthur anderson was the accounting firm at the center of enron. >> in hindsight they were prosecuted for something they didn't do. which was the big companies from five to four, they basically achieved nothing, except having less competition in the accounting world. i love the idea in theory that we could create a system like this. but there is actually something easier we can do before this, which is actually criminal prosecution of executives. but it is difficult to do that. but we can try harder at that, rather than try to dismantle them, you have a range, from the civil, the criminal, the entity. certainly you prosecute individuals as well as we did. but the entity itself needs, as
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corporations are the legal entities need to be held accountable. otherwise, as eric holder says, they go on forever. >> there is this bipartisan bill, from senators david vitter, a louisiana rather, and sherrod brown, to break up the big banks. the measure has changed from bill to bill, i haven't looked at them recently. but do you think we have the ability to do that without actually roiling the big banks, it is better than what we have now? >> yes, i think banks can be broken up, it is not something we have a lot of experience doing. and so you would get a lot of wailing and nashing of teeth from wall street. but if you have the will, they are half doing it in the uk with this thing called vickers, where they're basically telling the banks to break themselves in half and run themselves as two corporations, citybank broke
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itself in half, banks do this all the time. we could force them to do this. >> felix and eliot spitzer, i would love to keep talking about it. thank you for joining us. the first for the united nations is simply admitting they do have a problem. and they do have a problem. coming up. i'll be waiting for you in stall 5. it confirms your reservation and the location your car is in, the moment you land. it's just another way you'll be traveling at the speed of hertz. who emailed it to emily, who sent it to cindy, who wondered why her soup wasn't quite the same. the recipe's not the recipe... ohhh. [ female announcer ] ...without swanson. the broth cooks trust most when making soup. mmmm! [ female announcer ] the secret is swanson.
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we're lucky, it's not every day you find a companion as loyal as a subaru. love. it's what makes a subaru, a subaru. you know i love charts and graphs, i love them. i think they should be used all the time, except of course when just a couple of words would do, as well. case in point, this incredibly useless graph for drinking age in canada, courtesy of the canadian broadcasting corporation. the drinking age in canada is 19, everywhere. except for alberta, manitoba, and quebec. it divides up the ages from 17 to 20. and then marks them in 6/10th of a year increment.
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who does that? finally, a graph i do not like. speaking of drinking ages, what age do you have to be to figure out that drinking while budgeting is probably a bad idea. the u.n.'s troubles with the demon water are coming up. oh... save on roadside assistance from allstate! discounts from enterprise, avis and hertz! [ male announcer ] aarp has great deals on dining, entertainment, travel, and more... like geek squad, expedia and british airways... all in one place... aarpdiscounts.com. popcorn, your favorite... [ male announcer ] find offers from regal cinemas, norwegian cruise line and walgreens. hotel savings at hilton, hyatt and best western. and everyday discounts from denny's and kellogg's. they're great! [ male announcer ] all chosen just for aarp members. papa john's! [ male announcer ] with new offers every week. find deals on electronics and technology. and save on tickets to exciting concerts and shows.
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until this week, republicans have pretty much had the mckayla is not impressed about the
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sequester. they didn't feel that way, they were scared. in fact, john boehner called the cuts devastating. so they were never going to be allowed to happen. that was also the republican line during the election. romney saying that it would cost hundreds of thousands of jobs. no way we would let that happen. since then, though, the republicans have had a sequester eepipha eepiphany. the sequester, not so bad, full of useless stuff the government does, and the republicans love spending cuts, except one, they don't love it so much they are willing to dig deep into their own pockets to cover the cost, they cannot abide the idea that the american people in a time of austerity would be denied the essential government function of white house --
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>> i'll make you a deal, mr. president, jay carney, grab your pencil, i'll cover the white house expenses, if i can get the white house doors open, i'll pick up the tab. mr. carney, you know it is an offer you can't refuse. >> sean hannity is ready to contribute to the cause, tweeted, great idea, count me in, i'll pay for a week also. the rnc has begun a petition to open the house, and in the house, representative luis gomer tried to pass an amendment saying no more golf trips for president obama until they get going. they took a look at the things they do, one of the things, one of the least important of those things is they stand guard during the white house tours,
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making sure nobody tries to kill the president. so rather than cutting the things they need to do, they cut the white house tours. here is why they're so mad, the conservatives who don't want them to cut a deal on the sequester are outraged. as fox put it, the white house tours are typically scheduled through members of congress. visitors request to tour up to six months in advance. so these kids come to town, they can't get the tour their parents scheduled through their member of congress. and now, their parents are not so happy with the member of congress as well as the sequester, which of course, they shouldn't be. you know what makes me ill? the white house tours don't matter. they're really nice, they don't matter. the people they upset are the people who are in touch with members of congress. and so all of a sudden we are running and petitioning and putting forth money and rushing to do something about, something to solve this national white house tour crisis. but those folks are going to be
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fine without their tour. you know who may not be fine? the jobless who are seeing their unemployment checks, which in many cases all they have to live on now, cut by 10%. you know who may not be fine? the 775,000 women and children who may lose access to or denied benefits for a supplement program for women, infants and children, which has been extraordinarily successful at cutting malnutrition among young infants. you know who may not be fine? the formerly homeless people, who the department of houses and urban affairs say may be turned back onto our streets. and nobody on fox says they will dig into their pockets until no person has to suffer. luis gomer is not saying until every woman and child is made whole. because those folks, they don't
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know, and by and large their parents are not fundraisers. they don't come to d.c., and before they do come they don't get in touch with a staffer and build a relationship. they are just quietly hurting. but they don't want to ease the pain of the sequester, they want to end the political pain of the sequester. the gop's fear is that somebody will actually listen, somebody with a voice the political system will hear. the defense contractors, for instance, that is why they're trying so hard to get the pentagon more flexibility and more money. they want to continue the convenient political fiction that we can make these cuts and no one will really hurt. because government spending is just waste and fraud. but the way they're doing is not to make it so nobody actually hurts. it is just trying to ease the pain among the politically powerful, whose may be getting hurt. it will impact the very roof over their heads. everyone's retirement dream is different;
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aud >> there is a very serious problem at the united nations, and no, it has nothing to do with attacks from north korea, but has to do with the conduct of certain u.s. officials who are showing up to meetings, a little -- what is the word? drunk, they're drunk, they're a little -- very drunk. and thus, we turn to the u.s. ambassador for management and reform at the u.n. yesterday, he kindly asked his colleagues to save the suds until after their meetings.
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>> well, well, well. looks like somebody forget there is a rule against alcoholic beverages in fraternities on probation. laugh now, because you clowns have been on double secret probation since the beginning of the semester. >> double secret probation? >> i'm sorry, that was the wrong clip. that appears to be dean warner from animal house, yes, we have the right clip this time. >> as for the conduct of negotiations, mr. chairman, we make the modest proposal that the negotiating rooms should in future be an inebriation-zone, while the government is truly grateful by opportunities for ree recent past practices, let's save the champagne for the committee's reputation in the
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process. >> all right, the ambassador is being a buzz-kill here, but he is attempting to speed up the u.n.'s painfully slow budget negotiations, because if you will pardon the pun, this problem has been brewing for a while. in his remarks, he noted the behavior of the budget committee have contributed in recent negotiations the ability of the commission to conduct their important work in a timely and important fashion. and the u.n. is a body that loves a good happy hour. as the new york times reports the delegates actually have to leave the campus for cocktails these days, when they began to regulate the campuses in 2009, one of the first casualties of the construction was the lounge where for decades the delegate-working diplomacy was aided by a good, stiff drink. the staffs and a temporary outpost was